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SAN FRANCISCO (June 12, 2024) – At the conclusion of the 17th annual CTIC Conservation In Action tour, Regrow Ag, the Agriculture Resilience Platform provider, and Conservation Technology Information Center (CTIC), a 42-year-old non-profit organization that promotes, supports and provides information on conservation technologies and sustainable agriculture systems, jointly announced a continued and expanded partnership. The partnership will further the use of satellite-based data to publicly report the adoption and impact of key climate-smart ag practices, using technology only commercially available through Regrow.
Over the course of 15 years, Regrow developed the Operational Tillage Information System (known as OpTIS) in conjunction with CTIC and The Nature Conservancy. In this expanded partnership, Regrow and CTIC are announcing their intention to jointly progress annual updates of the national OpTIS dataset. This dataset was released for the years 2015-2021 and is only publicly available on CTIC’s website. This new dataset allows users to isolate years of data or track trends across time to study soil-building practices on croplands across all lower 48 states and differentiate among plants, including cash crops, cover crops and weeds. Regrow and CTIC are continuing to partner to continue to build market support for the next six years of OpTIS development and data sharing.
OpTIS tracks the adoption of climate-smart farming practices, including reduced tillage, cover crop use, and grasslands management, with publicly available remote sensing data. OpTIS is a core technology underpinning Regrow’s Agriculture Resilience Platform. OpTIS data feeds into the DeNitrification DeComposition (DNDC) environmental model, which enables Regrow to estimate the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions associated with agricultural practices, as well as the emissions reduced or sequestered when regenerative practices are adopted. DNDC operates in line with many of the industry’s leading standards, including those issued by Climate Action Reserve.
The science behind OpTIS and DNDC drives climate action through Regrow’s Agriculture Resilience Platform, namely through its scope 3 solution — Sustainability Insights — and its farmer-facing MRV platform. To date, these solutions monitor agricultural practices over 1.3B acres of land and have provided $19M in incentives to farmers, abating more than 598K metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e).
Ryan Heiniger, Executive Director of CTIC and a fourth-generation Iowa farmer, shared, “CTIC and its partners including Regrow are leading initiatives that are designed to address conservation agriculture’s most pressing issues, including soil health, erosion control and carbon sequestration.
Being able to rely on new technologies and actionable data helps us promote and study agricultural systems that are both economically viable and environmentally beneficial.
It also provides tools that allow the marketplace to reward farmers for the work they do to put carbon into the soil and protect America's natural resources.”
Dr. William Salas, Chief Strategy Officer for Regrow Ag, said, “Regrow has a history of partnering with research organizations to advance the science and technology behind satellite-based tracking of the adoption and impact of a variety of climate-smart ag practices."
"Working together, Regrow and CTIC will help accelerate the adoption of conservation and climate-smart ag practices, resulting in the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions and many other environmental benefits, including enhanced soil health and water quality.”
The agreement between Regrow Ag and CTIC will also fuel CTIC’s platforms and ensure that OpTIS is used to drive and promote climate-smart farming. Together, the organizations share a mission to promote the usage of OpTIS with government agencies, the private sector and academia to drive collaboration and facilitate increased practice adoption.
An intuitive visualization tool allows users to explore OpTIS data free on CTIC's website at ctic.org/OpTIS. The tool displays the data in dynamic maps and charts.
About Regrow
Regrow Ag powers Agriculture Resilience for today’s leading retailers, CPGs, processors, and farmers. Named one of the TIME100 Most Influential Companies of 2023, Regrow’s rapidly growing list of partners includes Cargill, General Mills, and Kellanova. With Regrow’s Agriculture Resilience Platform, companies across the ag supply chain gain the ability to assure their supply chains by accelerating the needed scale of GHG emissions reduction, adoption of regenerative farming practices, and proactive adaptation to the changing climate. A World Economic Forum Innovator and member of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development, Regrow has been named the No. 1 Most Innovative Company in Agriculture on Fast Company’s list of the World’s 50 Most Innovative Companies in 2023.
About CTIC
Founded in 1982 and based in West Lafayette, Indiana, the Conservation Technology Information Center (CTIC) is a non-profit organization committed to promoting conservation farming practices and sustainable agriculture. CTIC facilitates partnerships and collaborations among farmers, researchers, industry stakeholders, and government agencies to advance conservation and environmental stewardship in agriculture.
